


may the shackles be undone, may all the old words cease to rhyme

by empathyvevo



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Post-Episode: s14e20 Moriah, Revolution, Self-Worth Issues, Writing, via writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-02-09 15:13:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18640663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/empathyvevo/pseuds/empathyvevo
Summary: “It’s good, Sam. It’s really good. Have you ever thought about pursuing writing?”“I can’t. I have to go into the family business.”And look how well that turned out.





	may the shackles be undone, may all the old words cease to rhyme

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This has been bouncing around my head since the day after the finale, and I finally got a chance to finish putting it together. A couple of things:
> 
> 1\. This is written from Sam's POV. Not everything he says about himself is something I believe. Note that the "Self-Worth Issues" tag.
> 
> 2\. The title is taken from "God Was Never on Your Side" by Motorhead, which I believe is the song that was playing at the end of the finale? Forgive me if not. I Am Tired.
> 
> 3\. Uhhhh I don't think there's anything too trigger-y, but as always, please look out for yourself. Jack's death as well as his body is mentioned.
> 
> 4\. Look, I just love the idea that Sam may like writing, okay? He was good at it in high school, and maybe still would be, and as a writer, I take issue with the idea that writers always lie. Hence the fic.
> 
> 5\. I did not write this fic with the intent to bash Christianity; that being said, the show doesn't deal with the need for nuance regarding balance of existential questions and respect for religious identities very well, so I was sort of just working with what I had. The show makes Chuck/God out to be a dick, especially in the main characters' eyes, including Sam. This is, again, from Sam's perspective. So take of that what you will?
> 
> 6\. Have I mentioned I'm tired? And that this is un-beta'd and not well-edited, and pretty much pure wish fulfillment for me? Yeah. Anyways, I hope you enjoy!

_Writers lie_ , Sam thinks. _They lie._

He thinks it when he’s slashing his way through a hoard of risen dead, side by side with Dean and Cas, half-careful not to worsen his already serious self-injury, and he thinks it as the blood loss gets him dizzy, gets him useless. The monsters are coming and he is not helping, not really, not much.

But they aren’t dead, not yet. So that’s something.

It feels strange. Like it means something more, now.

Sam knows that he is supposed to be running, knows that there is a gap between where they are and where they need to be, but his head’s spinning, he’s looking around because of _Jack,_ they need to find him, his lifeless body ( _Writer’s lie,_ he hears in Castiel’s low, broken grumble) but there’s not enough _time_ and Sam needs to _find him_ _—_ but Dean is tugging on his arm and pulling him away, shouting words that Sam can’t hear over the ruckus, and Sam can’t _see_ , he can’t see or hear or feel if Cas is alright, if someone got Jack’s body—no, _Jack_ —and they’re so very, very screwed—

The ride back is quiet. Sam is still reeling, still pumped with adrenaline and anger and this strange, intimate disillusionment, but also stilled with grief for Jack, who is lying motionless in the backseat, head pillowed on Castiel’s lap and hollowed eyes glaring and intense. Castiel is stroking his fingers through Jack’s hair, in a motion a little too simple, a little too human. Dean keeps glancing back in the rear view mirror, like it’s odd, like it’s bad, and Sam is afraid that he will say something, because he knows what Dean would say and Dean _should not_ say something.

They didn’t get to say goodbye. It shouldn’t be surprising, because they almost never do, but there’s so much that Sam never told Jack, in the last year and in the last hours. He hasn’t said sorry for not being around when it mattered and he hasn’t—he hasn’t told Jack that he is sorry for the Malak box, that he never should have done it, that he regretted it the _second_ the lid shut.

Sam can’t recall if he ever told Jack that he loved him, either, or even said it back, just once. It feels like maybe he didn’t.

“I’ll get the garage,” Dean says when they’re back at the Bunker, because Sam is hurt and Cas has been silently combing through Jack’s hair. Sam tries to form words of agreement, of _yes_ , to say something, anything, but he just sighs. They need to figure out a game plan. They have so much to do. Jack will need a proper hunter’s funeral—Sam’ll be damned if he doesn’t get one, considering everything—and then they need to strategize how to go up against God himself.

Sometimes Sam thinks his life is weird. Mostly he’s just tired.

They don’t strategize. Dean wordlessly picks up a bottle of the stuff he only drinks when the world’s literally ending, and vanishes into the recesses of the Bunker, probably to his own room or else to one of the rooms that Sam’s never had much interest in learning about.

Cas is harder to read. He’s carrying Jack, now, like the dead weight of his body is nothing, and to Cas, Sam supposes, it is.

“Castiel?” Sam asks, feeling too stiff, too formal. Cas turns, silent and rigid and with eyes that have seen the death of the child that should have outlived them all.

“Yes?”

“I wanted to, um. I just—I’m sorry? I never should have gone along with—I’m sorry,” Sam exhales, the words heavy and fragmented and not enough.

Cas studies him, face solemn and hard, before he says, “I know,” with an expression that might have been a smile on any other day. Sam nods once and Castiel departs, Jack still in his arms.

They didn’t talk. None of them talked about anything. Not really.

Sam can’t really blame them, though. It’s not as though talking about these sorts of things comes naturally to any of them, and Sam has never been good at speaking when it counts, or if he ever was, he hasn’t been for so long that he’s forgotten. He remembers days and days of intent, laser-focused arguments with his dad, but they are all so long-passed that the specifics of the things Sam said or how he found the courage to say them are faded from his memory.

Talking when it counts isn’t really Sam’s strong suit. And he knows it can be dangerous. Like with Jack.

But sometimes he writes.

Not in a long while, though. Here and there, he’ll write different things—accounts of their hunts when information that adds to the existing lore arises, letters (like the ten he never sent to Amelia), stream-of-consciousness journal entries. He doubts they were ever any good, but it felt nice to _do_ something, nice to be able to say what he thought in the way that he meant it, even if no one would ever know or even care.

But it’s been a while. He’s not sure how long.

_Writers lie,_ Sam hears again, though it’s not a specific voice. It’s that voice in his head that tries to sound like another, but never quite succeeds in its attempt at eerie imitation.

But the more he hears it, the more he thinks it, the less and less sure he is.

His favorite books—are those lies, just because not every single event happened in the real world? Despite their emotional, vivid grapple of what it means to be human?

Or—when he was just a kid in high school, lonely and bored and miserable more often than not, and he found a way to make hunting and his family something palatable and fun, was that a lie?

_"It’s good, Sam. It’s really good. Have you ever thought about pursuing writing?”_

**_"I can’t. I have to go into the family business.”_ **

And look how well that turned out.

Sometimes, though rarely, and not in a long while, Sam allows himself a flighty daydream where he becomes a reclusive novelist somewhere far away, just him and his laptop and all the time in the world. He tries to justify it by imagining that, in this reality, none of the bad things he caused would have happened if he’d just been a writer.

But of course, he knows that’s not true. One way or another, the angels would have found him and tricked him, or worse. The universe would never let him hide for long.

And yet, after he’s done not-talking with Dean and Cas, he finds himself sitting in his room, at an unlittered desk. With his laptop.

Staring at things. News articles, posts on social media. Headlines about the end of times. So many people who have no clue why this, why _any_ of this is happening.

Sam shot God tonight. Or Chuck. Or whoever. The point is, Sam shot him, and he snapped. Technically speaking, Sam helped to start another apocalypse.

(Vaguely, he wonders about Anubis and his scales and thinks wryly that even if they manage to fix everything, the odds aren’t looking good.)

Even so, he can’t find it in himself to feel guilty. He feels _something_ , certainly, but it’s not the soul-crushing guilt he would have felt years ago, or maybe even days ago.

He reads one post that makes him feel more of the something, whatever it may be: _has anyone seen my sister????_

And he knows, he knows that bone-deep, desperate, terrifying feeling like he knows the rhythm of his own heartbeat. Or Dean’s, for that matter.

He clicks on the person’s account and sees one more recent post, a simple: _I don’t know why this is happening._

And it is simple. When he boils down the situation to its barest essentials, it’s the simplest thing in the world: the people need to know what’s happening. They need information. And he has it, and isn’t giving it to them.

There used to be some order to the lies, some reason. Only weeks ago did they tell that police officer that the lie was to protect those who were in the dark, but now they are not in the dark and they are unprepared. And if there is one thing Sam could do to help, it would be this. This thing that he’s thinking about.

_Writers lie,_ he thinks as he opens up a word document. _They lie,_ Sam thinks, but then he thinks about illustrated Knights of the Round Table comic books and how is own brain twisted them to make him feel unclean, unholy, but the words themselves were beautiful and sincere. He remembers Game of Thrones, and he remembers The Wizard of Oz, and he remembers every book he’s ever read, and he’s starting to think that maybe they’re fiction, but that doesn’t make them lies. There has to be a line, and a distinction.

The problem is, where to put it? The problem is, how to start?

He must type out dozens of beginning lines, trying to make them sound right, and important, and truthful. In the end, he goes for something simple.

_I’m Sam Winchester,_ he writes. _And I’m so, so sorry. You’ve heard this story before, but it’s time you hear it from me. There are things you need to know, and I should be the one to tell you._

It’s not perfect, but it’ll do.

And he will. He’ll tell them. Every goddamn detail; the heartache and the ugly and monsters they fought and the monsters they tried not to be. He’ll get down to the last drop of dripping red, toxic addiction and wasteland and disillusionment and bitter regrets and almost-happy days, and then he’ll go further and further until he hits the _truth_.

Sam will write it all, because it’s all the thing that they need to know. They don't need pretty or happy or nice, they need  _real_ and they need it soon and this is the best way he can think of.

_Writers lie_ , he thinks, the unformed words still managing to leave a bitter taste on his tongue. _But I won’t_ . _Not this time._

Sam hopes it’s a promise he can keep. It’s time someone beats Chuck at his own game, and changes the rules while they’re at it. God wants to wage war on his own damn world, on his favorite tv show? That’s just fine.

Sam’s got work to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed! You can find me @cagetraumasam on tumblr. If so inclined, feel free to drop me a line here or there. I live for that sweet sweet validation (or yelling or ranting about the show. Those also work)


End file.
